Archive for category Life of Abu Pokemon

There are just too many things bad going in the world, Abu Pokemon has thought about just giving up and putting things to rest but he is not the quitting type but since Abu Pokemon is not feeling like posting himself, we the Lego people working for him had to post for him.

From now on Abu Pokemon shall be known as Abu Bokemon to avoid any issues in the future, with this announcement here is his brand new website. http://www.abubokemon.com

Thank you, thank you, thank you. Abu Pokemon has been nominated for the Brass Crescent Awards. This means that people actually read this blog, what a relief.

Now that there is a burst of traffic on this blog because of the nomination I would like to point out to the new readers why they should vote for this blog. (Inspired from the Rally To Restore Sanity/Fear)

(1) If you do not vote for Abu Pokemon then the Terrorists will win:

(2) If you do not vote for Abu Pokemon then Britney Spears will become president:

(3) If you do not vote for Abu Pokemon then Gay Muslim Illegal Aliens will take your job:

Most likely many readers of this blog do not know that the first sunday of August is supposed to be Sister’s day. While I do not have a sister I do know someone who comes close and so this post is dedicated to her. The first sunday of August was about a week ago so this post is somewhat late but I presume that is somewhat appropriate since we haven’t talked to each other for a year now. If one does not talk to another person that does not necessarily mean that one cannot wish them well. To make a long story short, she asked for forgiveness from me but at that time perhaps I was not ready to forgive. And now we do not even talk even if we are in the same room and that does happen quite often.

A couple of weeks ago I was at the Jummah and the imam mentioned a narration from the life of Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) which I had heard before but had not really thought about.” The Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) was seated in a gathering with the companions when he (pbuh) looked towards the entrance and said, “A man of Paradise is coming.” At that instance someone who seemed to be very ordinary entered the mosque where they were seated. A companion was curious as to why the Prophet (pbuh) said this, so he followed the man to his house. This Sahabi told the man that he was a traveler and stayed as a guest. For three days the Sahabi saw nothing unusual, so he finally told the man what the Prophet had said and asked him what was so special. The man thought for a long time and said, “There might be one thing — before going to sleep every night I forgive everyone and sleep with a clean heart.” ” The narration made me realize the meaning of forgiveness and humility. The following verses from Moulana Rumi come to mind while reading this narration.

Our brotherhood is not one of despair
Even though you have broken
Your vows of repentance a hundred times, come.

Fast forward to the present. The other day, when I saw my sister, she looked so sad. I wanted to say hi and ask whats wrong or even say that I forgive you sister but I did not. You might ask why I did not say anything, its because I know that she would not respond positively or even respond at all.

And so whatever hardship or problems that she is going through I just pray to Allah that may he make it easier for her.

And to my sister I say, “Even though we may never talk to one another and you may never read this post, I wish all the best to you and I forgive you Nuna.”

Hopefully there will be a smile on her face today. May Allah have mercy on all of us. Ameen.

Two of the readers asked why I have taken the nom de plume Abu Pokemon given that this blog is not really about Pokemon. Instead of our regular stories in Lego we are going t take a detour and talk about the origins of Abu Pokemon.

If you are old enough, but not that old, you would be familar with Pokemon which was huge all over the world back in the late 1990s and early 2000s. Abu Pokemon is a combination of Abu and Pokemon. In Arabic the word Abu means father and thus Abu Pokemon means the father of Pokemon. For starters I am not the father of Pokemon or of anyone for that matter. Not only that but I am single so Abu anyone is somewhat of a misnomer for me. Hey I am just a simple grauate student. Ok, may be not that simple but you get the idea right?

The name Abu Pokemon has its origin in some really unreally ridiculous commentors on some of the blogs that I used to frequent. On some good Muslim blogs some people, also Muslims, would post very unreasonable comments and try to pass them off as Islamic with a holier than thou attitude. The problem was that their arguments were not even rooted in Islamic scholarship. Thats when I realized that to counter such people it may be best to either ignore then or to send them off to the city of Satireville. I choose Abu Pokemon as my nom de plume because the aforementioned commentaors had Abu someone in their names and Abu Pokemon sounds like a really odd pairing. I do have a knack for non-abvious pairings. Someone has to look out for Japanese Muslims, right?

I could have chose Legoman but that is not that exciting is it?

The name Abu Pokemon also makes me sound Arab which I am not. Besides, in Arabic Abu Pokemon would be pronounced Abu Bokemon. 🙂

Its not the case that the world is running out of absurd happenstance, because surely it is not but rather it is the case that I realized that I have been exposed to too many negative news and happenings with the danger that I might end up adopting a cynical attitude towards the world. This and the previous post is to offset this trend. Whenever we greet each other we say, “Peace be upon you” but it can sound mundane if it becomes part of the routine. If one sits back and think about it, one can indeed find peace.

I was talking to a friend of mine, CJ, after a few months and then I came up with the idea for the post. She is also a fellow graduate student and became a mother for the first time a few months ago and I was talking to her for the second time since childbirth. I was reminded of the famous saying of Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) said, “Heaven lies under the feet of mothers.” So this post is dedicated to CJ and to all the mothers in the world. It is something that goes over and above all cultures, religions and nations in the world.

(i) Congratulations CJ on becoming a mother.

(ii) May your son bring your joy and happiness in your life.

(iii) May you have a strong mother-son bond with her which will bring you love and happiness.

(iv) May be make you proud when you are old. Ameen

Of all people that I know in the blogsphere, one person that should be included in the dedication for this post is Suroor.